Purdue Ag Week is underway in West Lafayette. For the 12th year, Purdue students are highlighting the College of Agriculture and the ag industry on campus.
“Our goal is to reach those students who are not in the College of Ag to really educate them about the importance of the agriculture industry,” says MacKinley Cooksey, a Purdue Ag Econ major and a member of the Purdue Ag Week Task Force.
The Williamsport, Indiana native spoke with Hoosier Ag Today on Tech Tuesday, where a number of ag tech companies showed off their tech on the Memorial Mall, sparking a lot of interesting conversations with non-ag students.
“Purdue is a huge engineering school and with the technology and the data science that goes into agriculture, that’s kind of a way that we can show them that you too can be involved in the ag industry. It’s not just us College of Ag kids…It’s a way for them also, when we have these professionals out here, it’s a networking event for them too for internships, job opportunities.”
The week kicked off with Milk Monday. On Wednesday, Cooksey encourages students to visit and grab lunch at the Burger Bash sponsored by the Indiana Beef Council.
“We’ll be passing out 1800 burgers,” Cooksey explains. “We also have Ag Expo, so all of our sponsors will be here handing out promotional items and really getting students involved in their companies. On Thursday we’ll do ‘Hammer Down Hunger’. So, we are packing 60,000 meals. Those will be distributed locally but also to Ukraine to help with the effects of the war over there.”
Purdue Ag Week is entirely student led by 20 students on the Purdue Ag Week Task Force. Cooksey says this is her favorite group to be involved with at Purdue, and she loves sharing agriculture with the rest of campus.
“Agriculture is the one thing that connects us around the world. From here to South Africa, Asia, Europe. Everywhere around us, we are impacted by agriculture. Whether it’s the food that we eat, the clothes that we wear, even the pencils that we write with. And so, I’m really passionate about just showing everybody that you too are involved in the industry and it’s an industry that’s feeding us.”
Ag Week concludes with Farm to Fork Friday with around 10 producers educating students about their production process. We’ll have more from Purdue Ag Week in the coming days here on Hoosier Ag Today.
